


A Second Chance

by orphan_account



Category: Glee
Genre: Child Abuse, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-09
Updated: 2012-04-09
Packaged: 2017-11-03 08:29:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,207
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/379368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>GAM Prompt: The reason Blaine resents Cooper? When he left home at 17 because their dad was abusive and he couldn't take it any more, he tore the family apart. <br/>Bonus for Mr Anderson used to beat Blaine as well, but he stopped soon after Cooper left. Blaine didn't find out until now, but it was because Cooper blackmailed him into leaving his son alone. <br/>Break my heart, nonnies.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Second Chance

**Author's Note:**

> This literally wrote itself and it flew away from me. I wrote it in Coopers point of view because I feel that there are a lot of Fic's where it's always in Blaines view of how he's feeling about the situation and I wanted to take a step back be like, this is how it was for Cooper and this is how he got to the point where he is today, and how he's still struggling now. But he's also trying to face his past and make things right too.

The last time Blaine saw Cooper he had a black eye and a suitcase clutched in his hand. He'd taken Blaine into his arms and told him, "I'll see you soon Blainey-bear, I'll save you if it's the last thing I do." That was twelve years ago, and Blaine isn't that trusting five year old anymore.

 

The abuse started before Blaine was even born, Cooper learned how to hide bruises and walk without showing pain when he was seven. He learned how to conceal the pain even from himself, because the more it showed the angrier Mr. Anderson became.  Mr. Anderson was smart though, he didn't become a partner in a law firm because he wasn't, he knew that any and all bruising must be kept in spots that clothing would cover. He never hit Cooper above the collar bone or below the knees, not that they couldn't be explained away anyhow, Cooper was a rather rambunctious child.

 

When Cooper was twelve, Blaine was born. Blaine the light of Coopers life, with his amber colored eyes, thick black curls, and his fascination with Cooper. The abuse stops for a few months, until one afternoon when Blaine is teething. The baby's wailing cry drives Mr. Anderson into a fit of rage. Cooper couldn't walk without a limp for days afterword.

 

The years pass, and Cooper starts to take the blame for all of Blaine's messes, just to save him from their father's rigid hands. It works for awhile, until Cooper is seventeen, when Mr. Anderson goes too far. Cooper couldn't tell you what the fighting started over, something minor, that lead to something big, and Mr. Anderson snapping and breaking the, no visible marks over the collarbone rule. Cooper leaves that night.

 

\----

.....

 

Cooper comes back into town with a suitcase in one hand and a baby on his hip. When he shows up at the Anderson doorstep, the door is promptly slammed shut in his face by a surly teenaged Blaine. The baby starts to cry seconds later.

 

The door opens once again when Cooper is gently soothing the little girl, patting her back gently, and singing softly in her ear.

 

"What are you doing here?" Cooper hears the deep growl of his baby brother. He's propped against the doorway, arms crossed, and his triangular eyebrows are furrowed.

 

"I came to see my baby brother." Cooper tells him, adjusting the baby, because as much as he loves his daughter, she is heavy after a while.

 

"Well you're about twelve years too late. I'm not the kid you left behind anymore, and now I'm leaving bye." Blaine moves past him, messenger bag on one shoulder and a set of keys dangling in his hand. Cooper gets back in his own car, and heads to the hotel he'd booked. The baby sleeps surrounded by pillows thumb in her mouth. Cooper laments the time he'd lost with his brother, and how he never got to see him grow up.

 

It's a little after noon when Brooke, the baby, wakes up Cooper gives her a bottle and they're back on the road. McKinley High school is as run down as the rest of the town. The security sucks, and Cooper makes it through the halls like it's nothing. Brooke babble in his ear spit bubbles popping against his neck.

 

He finds Blaine talking to an effeminate boy, they're leaning in close together pressed against the wall with smiles on their faces. Blaine's smile fades away as Cooper calls his name. "What are you doing here?" He snarls, eyes glinting and so much like their fathers.

 

"I want to talk to you." Cooper says, he shifts Brooke as he stands there nervously. She tugs on his nose, sharp baby nails digging in painfully.

 

"What could there possibly be for us to talk about?" Blaine asks, making sharp hand gestures. The other boy just stares at him in contempt.

 

"I want you to meet your niece." Cooper speaks softly, deflating just a tiny bit.

 

"Cooper when you left you stopped being my brother. You left me with him and that was that." Blaine turns and walks away, the other boy trailing after him gives Cooper as look of sympathy.

 

\----

.....

 

The next time Cooper runs into Blaine it really is an accident, not that Blaine believes him. Cooper needed and oil change and to figure out why the car kept overheating and how to fix it. It's not like Cooper knew that Blaine has an after school job at Hummel Tires and Lube.

 

The shop is clean for an auto shop, and the mechanic is what Cooper classes as a stereotypical redneck. He's bald, wearing a hat, and has oil and grit caked on his hands.

 

"What can I do for you?" He ask when Cooper walks in, and looks at the outfit Cooper is wearing with a raised eyebrow. Cooper isn't quite sure what is wrong with the light pink polo and loose jean he's wearing, but they're comfortable and that is all that matters.

 

"I need an oil change and my engine keeps overheating." Is all Cooper offers flatly. The guy motions for Cooper to lead him to the car, he takes a look at it, and tells him too pull her in. When the car is in the garage Cooper takes Brooke out of her car seat.

 

Burt, as Cooper has learned his name, looks over and surveys the car once more, "How old is she?" He asks, head under the hood pulling the dipstick out of the oil holder.

 

"Three." Cooper tells him, and it's about right he can't name the exact date of when he got the car, just the year.

 

"Kid's awful small to be three." Burt laughs, looking back. He can feel the heat rising in his cheeks.

 

"You mean Brook, she's about eight months now." Cooper tells him, tickling the squirming baby's side. "I'm in town hoping to reconnect with my brother, so she'll have an awesome uncle growing up." It's about that time that Blaine walks in with the boy from school.

 

Burt looks up and pin points something with his eyes, "Kurt, need you to suit up and start working on the Jackson's Buick." The other boy nods and heads back through the door labeled 'Employees Only.'

 

"You followed me to where I work?" Blaine scoffs, arms crossed in a defensive pose. He's glaring at Cooper, and it makes him feel like he's fifteen years old again and he's expecting his dad to come up behind him and hit him again.

 

"N-no, I j-just needed an o-o-o-oil c-c-c-change." Cooper stutters, and looks down, and he hates himself a little for feeling so scared. He'd put that part of his life behind him, through years of counseling and therapy, and support groups. It took years for Cooper to stop flinching at sudden movements, took years for him to not flinch when a friend clapped him on the shoulder or offered a fist bump, took years for him not to look over his shoulder and cringe when he broke something, and it took him years to not turn into a weeping mess when someone accidentally startled him.

 

Blaine tilts his head and looks at his older brother, scoffs and walks into the front office. Cooper jumps when the door slams. He curses himself in his head.

 

"Well, I see you've met Blaine." Burt says dryly.

 

"That would be the brother I was telling you about." Cooper tells him softly, not looking up. Burt snorts.

 

"Good luck, he's one of the most stubborn kids I know. Well besides Kurt." Burt laughs, "You can go up front if you wanna talk to him. It gets pretty boring back here if you don't know what's going on." Cooper nods and makes his way to the door. He hates the way his handshakes as he reaches out to the door knob.  Brooke starts to fuss as Cooper gets more tense. She's clutching at his shirt and whimpering into his neck when he finally makes it to the front desk where Blaine is filing papers and checking E-Mails.

 

"Look, you left and as far as I'm concerned our relationship ended there. So kindly leave." Blaine doesn't even look up from the desk.

 

"You remind me of him you know." Cooper says, "You have his eyes and his mouth." Blaine's head snaps up, he's glaring. "I left because if I stayed he would have killed me."

 

"Yea well after you left he turned to me." Blaine snaps giving up the front that he's attempting to work. "You left and I had to figure out things on my own and learn how to hide bruises and how to hide my pain. I had no one." Blaine growls, "I was five years old."

 

Cooper is tensing up again, Blaine's voice is too similar to their fathers. "You think I don't know that? You think I didn't try to get you out of there the first chance I got? Because I did, and when that didn't work I threatened him so he wouldn't lay another hand on you again. I tried." Cooper's voice is so quiet that Blaine has to strain to hear him. Brooke is fussing louder and getting restless.

 

"What? He stopped after a few years, but I always thought it was because I -" Blaine catches himself, and Brooke lets out a wail. All the emotions are too much for her and the anger in the room is making her anxious.

 

"Because of what?" Cooper asks, bouncing lightly to sooth his baby.

 

"Because I told him I was gay and he didn't want to get 'fag' germs all over him." Blaine snorts, "What did you blackmail him with?" If Cooper is surprised at the fact that Blaine is gay, he doesn't show it.

 

"I had a P.I. trail him and the law firm, turns out daddy dearest liked to skim from the top."

 

\---

...

 

They talk for another hour, sometimes it's fighting, other times they stay calm and collected. Then Burt finishes with Coopers car. When he gets back to his hotel room he sets Brooke in the play area he's made and sits in the bathroom. He cries and shakes until he's sick, and by the time Brooke is crying in the other room because she needs something he's exhausted and emotionally drained.

 

He doesn't sleep that night, well not peacefully anyways, he's too high strung and every time he closes his eyes he sees his father and remembers the sharp pain from every time he'd ever hit him.

 

\---

...

 

Blaine calls Cooper three days into his stay in Lima, says that he's invited to the Hudmel family dinner. Cooper has to take an Ativan before he gets out of the car to calm his nerves. He's really starting to wish he'd stayed in Huntington Beach, his nerves haven't been this shot in years.

 

Carole answers the door when he knocks, she coos over Brooke and leads him to the living room where Kurt, Blaine, Burt, and a really tall boy are all sitting and watching Worlds Strictest Parents. Cooper doesn't find the irony amusing.

 

"So this is the long lost brother back from the dead?" Kurt quips, causing the unnamed boy to look up in surprise.

 

"You were dead?" He asks seriously, fascination in his eyes. "Does that mean you're a zombie now? Can I shoot you like in Call of Duty?" Cooper can feel the blood drain from his face.

 

"Finn." Kurt hisses, "You have been playing that deplorable game far too much, and you've scared Cooper." Finn looks properly chastised, and Kurt leads Cooper to a chair.

 

"How are you kid?" Burt asks, looking him over with a critical eye. He suddenly feels less than his twenty-nine years of age, and more like he's back at the Anderson house. It must show because Burt his looking at him like he might snap.

 

Dinner is full of stilted silences and awkward conversation, no one wants to address the giant purple elephant in the room. Afterwards though Blaine corners him in the hallway. He looks Cooper over, and sighs.

 

"I've always resented you, you know." Blaine starts, "You made it out and you were living the dream in my eyes, but you weren't were you?" Cooper shakes his head.

 

"I spent the first six years I was out trying to acclimate myself to non violent touches, to stop flinching at every loud noise, to stop breaking down every time someone surprised me, it took a long time." Cooper paused, takes a deep breath and starts again, "When I met Brooke's mom it took her a year to break through my walls and get my story, then it took her another year to convince me to marry her, and three more to convince me to have a kid with her. I was always so scared I would end up like dad. I'm still scared I will sometimes." Blaine looks at Cooper and his eyes are so open and honest that Cooper isn't sure what he's trying to say with them.

  
"I'm sorry he screwed you up that bad." Blaine says, "But I'm glad you're okay now, and I'm getting a chance to meet Brooke."


End file.
